Noted gun violence researcher Dr. Garen Wintermute, of the UC Davis Violence Prevention Research Program, says a just released study that implies that gun laws save lives is inconclusive.

The study, by Dr. Eric Fleegler of the Boston Children’s Hospital, was released in the online version of the Journal of the American Medical Association. It looked at the number and strength of gun laws in each state and compared them the number of firearms fatalities.

There is a correlation.

“What they found was that the more laws a state has on balance lower was its firearm mortality rate,” said Wintermute.

But he also said there is no evidence that gun laws were responsible for fewer gun deaths.

“The fact that two things are present at the same time doesn’t mean one of those things caused the other,” said Wintermute.